Apple’s US App Store Topped $400B in Developer Billings and Sales in 2024

Apple has released new figures highlighting the financial success of its U.S. App Store, announcing that the ecosystem generated $406 billion in developer billings and sales in 2024. This represents a near tripling of revenue since 2019, when it generated $142 billion, according to an official announcement made just ahead of Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC).

The company also emphasized that 90% of the billings and sales facilitated through the App Store did not incur any commission fees for developers.

These figures are derived from an Apple-funded study conducted by Professor Andrey Fradkin from Boston University Questrom School of Business and economist Dr. Jessica Burley from Analysis Group. Analysis Group has been working with Apple for years, providing reports and studies that aim to positively showcase the App Store’s market power amid increasing antitrust scrutiny. These studies often highlight that only a small fraction of Apple’s developer base pays commissions, and most of those are on a Small Business plan where the commission is reduced from 30% to 15%.

Despite these efforts, Apple has faced pressure to open the App Store to increased competition in the U.S. Recently, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers ruled that Apple violated a court order from Epic Games’ lawsuit by not reforming its App Store policies around external payments. This ruling forced Apple to allow developers to include links within their apps that direct users to web payment options, circumventing Apple’s commission structure.

Apple is currently appealing this ruling.

The ongoing dispute over App Store commissions has created tension within the iOS developer community. Many developers feel that their contributions are vital to the iPhone’s success and believe they should be treated with more appreciation rather than being seen as a source of revenue extraction. They feel their applications are part of the reason for the iPhone’s historical success.

Apple, however, maintains that the App Store is essential to developers’ success, providing a marketplace where consumers can easily discover and pay for software and services. Apple reports that earnings for U.S.-based developers have more than doubled in the last five years, while small business developers have seen a 76% increase in earnings from 2021 to 2024. This latter increase can be attributed to the launch of Apple’s Small Business Program in 2020, which reduced commissions for developers earning less than $1 million annually.

Apple also highlights that the App Store enables U.S. developers to access a global market of 175 countries and regions and prevents billions in fraudulent transactions. The company supports developers with 250,000 APIs and frameworks like HealthKit, Metal, Core ML, MapKit, and SwiftUI.

The report also details the revenue generated in areas where developers are not required to pay commission. In the past year, the U.S. App Store facilitated $277 billion in billings and sales from physical goods and services, $75 billion from in-app advertising, and $53 billion from digital goods and services. Since 2019, spending on physical goods and services has more than tripled, while in-app spending on digital goods and services and in-app advertising has more than doubled. Spending on general retail and grocery delivery has increased more than fourfold.